The federal government is about to pull the plug on the charitable status of Dying With Dignity Canada, a leading voice in the national debate on physician-assisted death.

Based on a recent audit, the Canada Revenue Agency has ruled that the organization should never have been registered as a charity because its activities have always had a political purpose: “to expand choice in dying.”

Founded it 1982, Dying With Dignity Canada bills itself as a “health and education charity focused on promoting choice and dignity at end of life.”

But in a letter to the charity delivered last week, the federal revenue agency said the organization was registered “in error” and will have its charitable tax status stripped in mid-February.

Dying With Dignity Canada will continue as a non-profit organization.

Donations to non-profit groups are not tax deductible.

Wanda Morris, chief executive officer of Dying with Dignity Canada, said the organization offers Canadians information about advance care planning and patients’ rights while also providing individual support for people at the end of their lives.

The charity is best known for making the moral and legal case for physician-assisted death.

“We’ve been a registered charity for 30 years and we’ve previously had an audit — so this was not anticipated,” said Morris, who refused to speculate about whether the audit and its conclusion were politically motivated.

The organization’s board is now exploring ways to raise money as a non-profit. “We’re confident that we can continue,” she said.

Wanda Morris, CEO of Dying with Dignity Canada, said the government’s unexpected decision to take away the organization’s charitable status means it will soon be unfettered by government rules that restrict its political activities.

Federal auditors examined the organization’s expenditures in 2011 and 2012 and concluded that more than 80 per cent of them were devoted to non-charitable activities, such as political activism, fundraising and administration.

It found that Dying With Dignity Canada does not conduct “any activities advancing education in the charitable sense.”

Instead, the auditors said, the organization publishes material that supports its point of view on medically-assisted suicide.

Since federal officials made a mistake by granting the organization charitable status in the first place, the revenue agency said it would “annul” rather than revoke Dying With Dignity Canada’s charitable status.

It means the organization will not be required to pay tax on the assets it has accumulated.

Dying with Dignity Canada has four full-time staff members and relies heavily on a national network of volunteers to conduct its work.

The charity brought in $403,000 in 2013, and according to preliminary figures, its revenues doubled last year to more than $800,000.

Morris said that revenue increase coincided with intense activity around the issue of physician-assisted dying.

Quebec last year passed right-to-die legislation and the Senate is now considering a similar bill brought forward by Conservative MP Steven Fletcher. The Supreme Court of Canada is also expected to rule soon on the question of whether the federal prohibition on assisted dying should be lifted for the terminally ill.

When it becomes a non-profit next month, Dying With Dignity Canada will no longer be subject to federal rules that restrict the political activity of a charity. The federal government says registered charities can only conduct “incidental” political activity, which it defines as 10 per cent of an organization’s overall work.

“The timing is very interesting,” Morris said “Being able to be an unfettered political advocate at this point is certainly an upside for us.”

New Democratic MP Murray Rankin, Opposition critic for national revenue, called the timing of the charity’s audit “passing strange” given the heated national debate on physician-assisted death.

“It’s yet another example of the government targeting those charities with which it disagrees ideologically,” he charged.

In 2012, the Canada Revenue Agency was ordered to better police the political activity of registered charities. Many high-profile environmental and anti-poverty groups, including the David Suzuki Foundation, the Tides Canada Foundation, and Canada Without Poverty, have been audited as a result.

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